Black September di Yordania
Posted: Sat Jun 05, 2010 2:34 pm
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black_September_in_Jordan
Muslim lawan Muslim
September 1970 is known as the Black September (Arabic: أيلول الأسود) in Arab history and sometimes is referred to as the "era of regrettable events." It was a month when Hashemite King Hussein of Jordan moved to quash the militancy of Palestinian organizations and restore his monarchy's rule over the country.[3] The violence resulted in the deaths of thousands of people, the vast majority Palestinian.[2] Armed conflict lasted until July 1971 with the expulsion of the PLO and thousands of Palestinian fighters to Lebanon.
Contents [hide]
1 Background
1.1 Battle of Karameh
1.2 Seven-point agreement
1.3 Ten-point edict
2 Events of September 1970
2.1 Aircraft hijackings
2.2 Jordanian army attacks
2.3 Syrian intervention attempt
2.4 U.S. and U.S.S.R. involvement
2.5 Hussein-Arafat Cairo agreement
2.6 Casualties
2.7 After September 1970
3 Aftermath and regional consequences
4 Footnotes
4.1 References
5 External links
[edit]
Background
The United Nations Partition Plan for Palestine in late 1947 led to civil war; the end of the British Mandate of Palestine and the unilateral Israeli Declaration of Independence in May 1948, led to the invasion of the former borders of Palestine by neighboring Arab states and the 1948 Arab-Israeli War. The fighting between Israel and the Arab states was halted with the UN-mediated 1949 Armistice Agreements, but the remaining Palestinian territories came under the control of Egypt and Trans-Jordan. In 1949, Trans-Jordan officially changed its name to Jordan; in 1950, it annexed the West Bank of the Jordan River, and brought Palestinian representation into the government.
At the time, the population east of the Jordan River contained over 400,000 Palestinian refugees who made up one-third of the population; another third of the population was Palestinians on the West Bank. Only one third of the population consisted of the original inhabitants of Trans-Jordan, which meant that the Jordanians had become a ruling minority over a Palestinian majority. This proved to be a mercurial element in internal Jordanian politics and played a critical role in the political opposition. Since the 1950s, the West Bank had become the center of the national and territorial aspects of the Palestinian problem that was the key issue of Jordan's domestic and foreign policy. According to King Hussein, the Palestinian problem spelled "life or death" for Jordan and would remain the country's overriding national security issue.[4]
King Hussein feared an independent West Bank under PLO administration would threaten the autonomy of his Hashemite kingdom.[5][6]. The Palestinian factions were supported variously by many Arab regimes, most notably Egypt's President Nasser, who gave political support; and Saudi Arabia, which gave financial support.[citation needed] The Palestinian nationalist organization Fatah started organizing attacks against Israel in January 1965, and it was subject to repeated cross-border attacks by Palestinian fedayeen; these often drew disproportionate reprisals that killed and injured Jordanians as well. [7] The Samu Incident was one such reprisal. Jordan had long maintained secret contacts with Israel concerning peace and security along their border. Due to internal splits within the Jordanian government and population however, many of King Hussein's orders to stop these raids were not obeyed, and some Jordanian commanders along the Israeli-Jordanian border began giving the Palestinian raids passive assistance.[8]
[edit]
Battle of Karameh
Main article: Battle of Karameh
The Israel Defense Forces entered the village of Karameh on March 21, 1968.[9] The Israelis, who aimed to destroy Fatah in their assault, were successful in destroying the Fatah headquarters (but not eliminating the Fatah movement) withdrew after taking approximately 150 prisoners and killing about 200 Arab fighters (Palestinian and Jordanian). Arafat managed to leave Karameh at night after being informed of the impending attack. King Hussein gave orders to the Jordanian forces not to intervene but Jordanian General Mash'hor Haditha and some Jordanian officers ignored their king's orders and engaged the battle. The arrival of Jordanian troops in full-force shifted the tide of the battle and managed to cause a stalemate with the IDF. Although the Israelis were stalemated, their intent was not to push through into Jordan but destroy the Fatah camps near the border, which was accomplished. According to the Israelis, IDF casualties from the battle were 28 soldiers killed and 69 wounded, with other losses including the destruction of four tanks, three half tracks, two armoured cars, and an airplane shot down by Jordanian forces. According to the Jordanians, Israeli casualties were 250 soldiers killed and 50 wounded, 27 tanks, 24 armored cars, 37 camions. About 100 Palestinian fedayeen were killed in the battle, with another 100 wounded and 120–150 captured. The Jordanians sustained 61 fatalities, 108 wounded, and the destruction of thirteen tanks. Although the Jordanian Army had been decisive, the incident was a public relations coup for the PLO and Arafat. The Karameh battle boosted Palestinian morale and gave the PLO additional prestige within the Arab community.[10]
Yasser Arafat, claimed this as a victory (in Arabic, "karameh" means "dignity") and quickly became a national hero portrayed as one who dared to confront Israel, even though he fled before the fighting erupted. Masses of young Arabs joined the ranks of his group Fatah. Under pressure, Ahmad Shukeiri resigned from the PLO leadership and in July 1969, Fatah joined and soon controlled the PLO.
[edit]
Seven-point agreement
In Palestinian enclaves and refugee camps in Jordan, the Jordanian Police and army were losing their authority. Uniformed PLO militants openly carried weapons, set up checkpoints and attempted to extort "taxes." During the November 1968 negotiations, a seven-point agreement was reached between King Hussein and Palestinian organizations:
Members of these organizations were forbidden from walking around cities armed and in uniform
They were forbidden to stop and search civilian vehicles
They were forbidden from competing with the Jordanian Army for recruits
They were required to carry Jordanian identity papers
Their vehicles were required to bear Jordanian license plates
Crimes committed by members of the Palestinian organizations would be investigated by the Jordanian authorities
Disputes between the Palestinian organizations and the government would be settled by a joint council of representatives of the king and of the PLO.
The PLO did not live up to the agreement, and instead came to be seen more and more as a state within a state in Jordan. Discipline within the Palestinian militias was often poor, and there was no central power to control the different groups. Many of them were recently formed, and new groups sprang up spontaneously after the Karameh battle, or were set up by foreign governments such as Syria and Iraq. This created a bewildering scene of groups spawning, merging and splintering rapidly, often trying to outdo each other in radicalism to attract recruits. Some left-wing Palestininan movements, such as the PFLP and the DFLP, began openly questioning the Jordanian monarchy and raising slogans calling for the "resistance" to seize power, while also stirring up conservative and religious feelings by provocative anti-religious statements and actions. In other cases, illustrating the lack of discipline on the fringes of the movement, fedayeen activity became a cover for gangsterism, with theft of vehicles or extortion from local merchants, by claiming that the goods were confiscated for the battle effort or were a donation to "the cause". By far the largest Palestinian faction, Arafat's Fatah, preached non-involvement in Jordanian affairs, but all members did not necessarily live up to this slogan. Fatah also protected smaller movements from being singled out for retaliation from the government, by threatening to stand by them in any armed clashes. Palestinians also claimed that there were numerous agents provocateurs from Jordanian or other security services present among the fedayeen, deliberately trying to upset political relations and provoke justifications for a crackdown.
Between mid-1968 and the end of 1969, no fewer than five hundred violent clashes occurred between the Palestinian guerrillas and Jordanian security forces.[citation needed] Acts of violence against civilians and kidnappings frequently took place. Chief of the Jordanian royal court (and subsequently a Prime Minister) Zaid al-Rifai claimed that in one extreme instance, "the fedayeen killed a soldier, beheaded him, and played soccer with his head in the area where he used to live." [11] Jordanian security forces would typically respond to fedayeen provocations and transgressions by rounding them up and sending them to the front. Outbreaks of violence were continuously on the rise. It was believed that as long as both parties maintained the condition that they would not enter or remain in the capital a large scale clash could have been avoided.[dubious – discuss]
On the military side of things, the PLO also continued attacking Israel from Jordanian territory with little regard to Jordanian authority or security. Heavy Israeli reprisals resulted in both Palestinian and Jordanian civilian and military casualties, and the threat of larger-scale Israeli invasion loomed large.
[edit]
Ten-point edict
King Hussein visited U.S. President Richard Nixon, and the Egyptian President Nasser in February 1970. Upon his return, King Hussein published a ten-point edict, restricting activities of the Palestinian organizations. On February 11, fighting broke out between Jordanian security forces and the Palestinian groups in the streets of Amman, resulting in about 300 deaths. Trying to prevent the violence spinning out of control, King Hussein announced "We are all fedayeen" and fired the interior minister who was hostile towards the Palestinians.
Armed Palestinians set up a parallel system of visa controls, customs checks and checkpoints in Jordanian cities and added more tensions to already polarized Jordanian society and the army.
In July, Egypt and Jordan accepted the U.S.-backed Rogers Plan that called for a cease fire in the War of Attrition between Israel and Egypt and for Israel's negotiated withdrawal from territories occupied in 1967, according to the United Nations Security Council Resolution 242, but the plan mentioned the West Bank to be under King Hussein's authority and that was unacceptable for the more radical organizations; the PLO, George Habash's Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP), and Naif Hawatmeh's Democratic Front for the Liberation of Palestine (DFLP) opposed the plan, criticized and scandalized Nasser. Thus, the PLO lost the good relations with Nasser and his protection. Reportedly, the plan was a trap conceived to destroy PLO's relations with Nasser, and it had never been implemented.[1] As a result, King Hussein started his military campaign against the PLO. Between February and June 1970, about a thousand lives were lost in Jordan alone due to the conflict. The more radical organizations in the PLO decided to undermine Hussein's pro-Western regime.
Muslim lawan Muslim
September 1970 is known as the Black September (Arabic: أيلول الأسود) in Arab history and sometimes is referred to as the "era of regrettable events." It was a month when Hashemite King Hussein of Jordan moved to quash the militancy of Palestinian organizations and restore his monarchy's rule over the country.[3] The violence resulted in the deaths of thousands of people, the vast majority Palestinian.[2] Armed conflict lasted until July 1971 with the expulsion of the PLO and thousands of Palestinian fighters to Lebanon.
Contents [hide]
1 Background
1.1 Battle of Karameh
1.2 Seven-point agreement
1.3 Ten-point edict
2 Events of September 1970
2.1 Aircraft hijackings
2.2 Jordanian army attacks
2.3 Syrian intervention attempt
2.4 U.S. and U.S.S.R. involvement
2.5 Hussein-Arafat Cairo agreement
2.6 Casualties
2.7 After September 1970
3 Aftermath and regional consequences
4 Footnotes
4.1 References
5 External links
[edit]
Background
The United Nations Partition Plan for Palestine in late 1947 led to civil war; the end of the British Mandate of Palestine and the unilateral Israeli Declaration of Independence in May 1948, led to the invasion of the former borders of Palestine by neighboring Arab states and the 1948 Arab-Israeli War. The fighting between Israel and the Arab states was halted with the UN-mediated 1949 Armistice Agreements, but the remaining Palestinian territories came under the control of Egypt and Trans-Jordan. In 1949, Trans-Jordan officially changed its name to Jordan; in 1950, it annexed the West Bank of the Jordan River, and brought Palestinian representation into the government.
At the time, the population east of the Jordan River contained over 400,000 Palestinian refugees who made up one-third of the population; another third of the population was Palestinians on the West Bank. Only one third of the population consisted of the original inhabitants of Trans-Jordan, which meant that the Jordanians had become a ruling minority over a Palestinian majority. This proved to be a mercurial element in internal Jordanian politics and played a critical role in the political opposition. Since the 1950s, the West Bank had become the center of the national and territorial aspects of the Palestinian problem that was the key issue of Jordan's domestic and foreign policy. According to King Hussein, the Palestinian problem spelled "life or death" for Jordan and would remain the country's overriding national security issue.[4]
King Hussein feared an independent West Bank under PLO administration would threaten the autonomy of his Hashemite kingdom.[5][6]. The Palestinian factions were supported variously by many Arab regimes, most notably Egypt's President Nasser, who gave political support; and Saudi Arabia, which gave financial support.[citation needed] The Palestinian nationalist organization Fatah started organizing attacks against Israel in January 1965, and it was subject to repeated cross-border attacks by Palestinian fedayeen; these often drew disproportionate reprisals that killed and injured Jordanians as well. [7] The Samu Incident was one such reprisal. Jordan had long maintained secret contacts with Israel concerning peace and security along their border. Due to internal splits within the Jordanian government and population however, many of King Hussein's orders to stop these raids were not obeyed, and some Jordanian commanders along the Israeli-Jordanian border began giving the Palestinian raids passive assistance.[8]
[edit]
Battle of Karameh
Main article: Battle of Karameh
The Israel Defense Forces entered the village of Karameh on March 21, 1968.[9] The Israelis, who aimed to destroy Fatah in their assault, were successful in destroying the Fatah headquarters (but not eliminating the Fatah movement) withdrew after taking approximately 150 prisoners and killing about 200 Arab fighters (Palestinian and Jordanian). Arafat managed to leave Karameh at night after being informed of the impending attack. King Hussein gave orders to the Jordanian forces not to intervene but Jordanian General Mash'hor Haditha and some Jordanian officers ignored their king's orders and engaged the battle. The arrival of Jordanian troops in full-force shifted the tide of the battle and managed to cause a stalemate with the IDF. Although the Israelis were stalemated, their intent was not to push through into Jordan but destroy the Fatah camps near the border, which was accomplished. According to the Israelis, IDF casualties from the battle were 28 soldiers killed and 69 wounded, with other losses including the destruction of four tanks, three half tracks, two armoured cars, and an airplane shot down by Jordanian forces. According to the Jordanians, Israeli casualties were 250 soldiers killed and 50 wounded, 27 tanks, 24 armored cars, 37 camions. About 100 Palestinian fedayeen were killed in the battle, with another 100 wounded and 120–150 captured. The Jordanians sustained 61 fatalities, 108 wounded, and the destruction of thirteen tanks. Although the Jordanian Army had been decisive, the incident was a public relations coup for the PLO and Arafat. The Karameh battle boosted Palestinian morale and gave the PLO additional prestige within the Arab community.[10]
Yasser Arafat, claimed this as a victory (in Arabic, "karameh" means "dignity") and quickly became a national hero portrayed as one who dared to confront Israel, even though he fled before the fighting erupted. Masses of young Arabs joined the ranks of his group Fatah. Under pressure, Ahmad Shukeiri resigned from the PLO leadership and in July 1969, Fatah joined and soon controlled the PLO.
[edit]
Seven-point agreement
In Palestinian enclaves and refugee camps in Jordan, the Jordanian Police and army were losing their authority. Uniformed PLO militants openly carried weapons, set up checkpoints and attempted to extort "taxes." During the November 1968 negotiations, a seven-point agreement was reached between King Hussein and Palestinian organizations:
Members of these organizations were forbidden from walking around cities armed and in uniform
They were forbidden to stop and search civilian vehicles
They were forbidden from competing with the Jordanian Army for recruits
They were required to carry Jordanian identity papers
Their vehicles were required to bear Jordanian license plates
Crimes committed by members of the Palestinian organizations would be investigated by the Jordanian authorities
Disputes between the Palestinian organizations and the government would be settled by a joint council of representatives of the king and of the PLO.
The PLO did not live up to the agreement, and instead came to be seen more and more as a state within a state in Jordan. Discipline within the Palestinian militias was often poor, and there was no central power to control the different groups. Many of them were recently formed, and new groups sprang up spontaneously after the Karameh battle, or were set up by foreign governments such as Syria and Iraq. This created a bewildering scene of groups spawning, merging and splintering rapidly, often trying to outdo each other in radicalism to attract recruits. Some left-wing Palestininan movements, such as the PFLP and the DFLP, began openly questioning the Jordanian monarchy and raising slogans calling for the "resistance" to seize power, while also stirring up conservative and religious feelings by provocative anti-religious statements and actions. In other cases, illustrating the lack of discipline on the fringes of the movement, fedayeen activity became a cover for gangsterism, with theft of vehicles or extortion from local merchants, by claiming that the goods were confiscated for the battle effort or were a donation to "the cause". By far the largest Palestinian faction, Arafat's Fatah, preached non-involvement in Jordanian affairs, but all members did not necessarily live up to this slogan. Fatah also protected smaller movements from being singled out for retaliation from the government, by threatening to stand by them in any armed clashes. Palestinians also claimed that there were numerous agents provocateurs from Jordanian or other security services present among the fedayeen, deliberately trying to upset political relations and provoke justifications for a crackdown.
Between mid-1968 and the end of 1969, no fewer than five hundred violent clashes occurred between the Palestinian guerrillas and Jordanian security forces.[citation needed] Acts of violence against civilians and kidnappings frequently took place. Chief of the Jordanian royal court (and subsequently a Prime Minister) Zaid al-Rifai claimed that in one extreme instance, "the fedayeen killed a soldier, beheaded him, and played soccer with his head in the area where he used to live." [11] Jordanian security forces would typically respond to fedayeen provocations and transgressions by rounding them up and sending them to the front. Outbreaks of violence were continuously on the rise. It was believed that as long as both parties maintained the condition that they would not enter or remain in the capital a large scale clash could have been avoided.[dubious – discuss]
On the military side of things, the PLO also continued attacking Israel from Jordanian territory with little regard to Jordanian authority or security. Heavy Israeli reprisals resulted in both Palestinian and Jordanian civilian and military casualties, and the threat of larger-scale Israeli invasion loomed large.
[edit]
Ten-point edict
King Hussein visited U.S. President Richard Nixon, and the Egyptian President Nasser in February 1970. Upon his return, King Hussein published a ten-point edict, restricting activities of the Palestinian organizations. On February 11, fighting broke out between Jordanian security forces and the Palestinian groups in the streets of Amman, resulting in about 300 deaths. Trying to prevent the violence spinning out of control, King Hussein announced "We are all fedayeen" and fired the interior minister who was hostile towards the Palestinians.
Armed Palestinians set up a parallel system of visa controls, customs checks and checkpoints in Jordanian cities and added more tensions to already polarized Jordanian society and the army.
In July, Egypt and Jordan accepted the U.S.-backed Rogers Plan that called for a cease fire in the War of Attrition between Israel and Egypt and for Israel's negotiated withdrawal from territories occupied in 1967, according to the United Nations Security Council Resolution 242, but the plan mentioned the West Bank to be under King Hussein's authority and that was unacceptable for the more radical organizations; the PLO, George Habash's Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP), and Naif Hawatmeh's Democratic Front for the Liberation of Palestine (DFLP) opposed the plan, criticized and scandalized Nasser. Thus, the PLO lost the good relations with Nasser and his protection. Reportedly, the plan was a trap conceived to destroy PLO's relations with Nasser, and it had never been implemented.[1] As a result, King Hussein started his military campaign against the PLO. Between February and June 1970, about a thousand lives were lost in Jordan alone due to the conflict. The more radical organizations in the PLO decided to undermine Hussein's pro-Western regime.